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A National Patient Library, a public/private partnership, is proposed to identify and vet information for consumers. Library staff will help tailor general information to consumers' specific needs. The library includes an electronic network. The principal focus of the library's information is controversial and experimental procedures, pharmaceuticals, and medical devices.

Legal materials are expensive, bulky, and extremely time sensitive. Selecting the appropriate means of ensuring easy access to easily-retrievable, timely legal materials is of extreme importance to any lawyer. The author gives an overview of the various means of retrieving necessary research, including the strengths and weaknesses of each of the various options.

This Order changes the funding year for the schools and libraries universal service support mechanism from a calendar year cycle to a fiscal year cycle. This Order also adjusts the amount of money available for schools and libraries, and rural health care providers for the period from January 1, 1998 through June 30, 1999. In addition, this Order establishes rules of priority when a filing window is in effect.

In this document, the Commission seeks comment on the Report and Proposed Plan of Reorganization (Plan) filed on July 1, 1998 by the Universal Service Administrative Company (USAC), the Schools and Libraries Corporation (SLC), and the Rural Health Care Corporation (RHCC). The Plan proposes a revised adminstrative structure of the federal universal service support mechanisms. RHCC filed a Separate Statement of the Rural Health Care Corporation and Request for Three Changes in the Plan, dissenting from certain provisions of the proposed Plan. In this document, the Commission also seeks comment on other issues regarding the administration of the federal universal service support mechanisms, including processes for Commission review of actions by USAC, SLC, and RHCC.

This article discusses the general economics of journal and monograph publishing. The costs related to acquisition, production, marketing, and distribution of journals and monographs are analyzed by considering "typical" cost elements borne by all scientific and medical publishers.

The decline in federal support of educational programs has made it difficult for libraries to apply new technologies to improve practices and services. While federal support has declined in constant dollars, there has been a modest increase in grants from private foundations. Current U.S. policies require federal agencies to recover full costs of rendering services (Circular A-25) and require the transfer of many federal service-oriented activities to the commercial sector (Circular A-76). Additionally, the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1980 is inhibiting the production and dissemination of federal publications. Government pursuit of these policies adds a heavy economic burden to libraries and threatens to reduce access to the scholarly and scientific record.